Marc E. Angelucci sent a message using the contact form at http://www.jordannews.com/contact:

Why did the submission, "If you are a victim of domestic violence, get help" (7/9) leave male victims of domestic violence and their children invisible?

The latest data from the Centers for Disease Control shows: "In the United States every year, about 1.5 million women and more than 800,000 men are raped or physically assaulted by an intimate partner," at http://www.cdc.gov/ncipc/factsheets/ipvfacts.htm

Although men underreport more than women in crime data, sociological data shows women initiate domestic violence as often as men, that women use weapons more than men, and that 38% of injured victims are men. California State University Professor Martin Fiebert summarizes almost 200 of these studies online at http://www.csulb.edu/~mfiebert/assault.htm

A recent 32-nation study by the University of New Hampshire found female students initiate partner violence as often as male students and
controlling behavior exists equally in perpetrators of both sexes.
http://www.unh.edu/news/cj_nr/2006/may/em_060519male.cfm?type=n
http://pubpages.unh.edu/~mas2/ID41E2.pdf

Both the University of Florida and of Washington recently found similar results in their domestic violence studies.
http://news.ufl.edu/2006/07/13/women-attackers/
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070625111433.htm

A recent study in the Journal of Family Violence found many male callers to a national hotline experienced high rates of severe violence from female partners who used violence to control them, at http://www.springerlink.com/content/a7q0032j88817218/fulltext.pdf

When we ignore male victims, we also ignore their children, who continue to be damaged by witnessing the violence regardless of how severe it is.
We cannot break this intergenerational cycle by ignoring half of it.
That's why a global coalition of experts has formed to support a research-based, inclusive approach, and their website has solid data showing women initiate the violence as often as men, at http://www.nfvlrc.org/

Marc E. Angelucci
President
Los Angeles chapter
National Coalition of Free Men
http://www.ncfmla.org

For more, see:

A University of Florida study recently found women are more likely than men to "stalk, attack and abuse" their partners.
http://news.ufl.edu/2006/07/13/women-attackers/

A University of Washington study recently found women were nearly twice as likely as men to perpetrate domestic violence in the past year including kicking, biting or punching their partner, threatening to hit or throw something at their partner, and pushing, grabbing or shoving their partner. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070625111433.htm

A University of Pennsylvania emergency room report found 13% of men reported being assaulted by a female partner in the previous 12 months, of which 50% were choked, kicked, bitten, punched, or had an object thrown at them, 37% involved a weapon, and 14% required medical attention, at
http://www.aemj.org/cgi/content/abstract/6/8/786

University of Pennsylvania Professor Richard Gelles states: "Contrary to the claim that women only hit in self-defense, we found that women were as likely to initiate the violence as were men. In order to correct for a possible bias in reporting, we reexamined our data looking only at the self-reports of women. The women reported similar rates of female-to-male violence compared to male-to-female, and women also reported they were as likely to initiate the violence as were men," in his article reprinted at http://www.ncfmla.org/gelles.html

This data is recognized by the American Psychological Association.
http://www.apa.org/monitor/oct06/pc.html

This Canadian government report also recognizes the above data.
http://www.phac-aspc.gc.ca/ncfv-cnivf/familyviolence/pdfs/Intimate_Partn...

Archer, J., "Sex differences in aggression between heterosexual partners:
A meta-analytic review," Aggression and Violent Behavior (7) 2002, 313-351, http://www.maennerbuero-trier.de/Archer_2002.pdf

Dutton, D., & Corvo, K., "Transforming a flawed policy: A call to revive psychology and science in domestic violence research and practice," (11) 2006, 457-483, http://www.nfvlrc.org/docs/DuttonCorvo.policypaper.pdf

Professor Murray A. Straus, Family Research Laboratory, University of Pennsylvania, http://pubpages.unh.edu/~mas2/

(Mathias Baden is the editor of the Jordan Independent. He can be reached at editor@jordannews.com.)